


World War B

by darrenzieger



Series: World War B [2]
Category: Bob's Burgers (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2020-02-09
Packaged: 2020-02-10 07:37:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18655915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darrenzieger/pseuds/darrenzieger
Summary: As I generally do, I'm writing this with a general outline in mine but working out the details as I go along.As a result, I occasionally have to go back and revise earlier chapters to support details in newer ones.In this case, I'm going to have to go back to chapter one and clarify the severity of Linda's drinking problem. I had established that she was improving a bit, but I find that that's not serving the story.There are also a few more minor details I need to fix, but nothing that particularly affects the story.With that in mind, enjoy chapter three.





	1. Chapter 1

LOUISE

Dad’s on a tear.

“Someone around here has to get up to speed on raising livestock. We need meat. We need protein.”

“There's no livestock left, Dad," says Tina. "The plague wiped out most mammals. You know that. Maybe some cows or something will turn up someday, but for the moment, we have to concentrate on corn and wheat and fruit and stuff.

You're right that we need protein, but meat isn’t the only source. There are vegetarian alternatives.”

“Yeah, Dad sneers, "but a) vegetarians are stupid, and b) I went to the Home Depot garden section last week, and I didn’t see any Tofu Tree seeds, so...”

“Um, the Home Depot store in your joke - did they have soybean seeds? Because tofu is made from soy milk curds.”  
  
“There’s no such thing as 'soy milk,' Tina!” Dad spits back. “Beans don’t make milk. It’s a lie they used to sell overpriced bean-flavored water to stupid vegetarians, and if we’re going to make a better world this time around, and avoid the evils of the past, we can’t perpetuate that lie. It’s a slippery slope, Tina.” 

I haven’t seen dad this agitated in months. He’s pacing around the kitchen, ignoring his breakfast.

“A slippery slope! I won’t have slippery slopes in my town, Tina. I want dry, easily navigable slopes!” 

Tina’s not upset, or even offended, by Dad’s ranting at her. She knows it not her he’s really angry at. 

I don’t know what _specific_ bug has crawled up Dad’s ass today, but it’s always something. If you gave Dad a colonoscopy, it would be like looking under a log in the woods. Lotta bugs.

Since he’s taken on running the town, Dad’s got 99 problems on a _good_ day. 

“Bobby, calm down,” says Mom, her speech only slightly slurred. She’s been up for about 30 minutes, so she’s only been drinking for 25. 

“You can do plenty with veggies. I mean, particularly you - you’re a professional chef. You’re an artist”

Dad’s not giving an inch. “I’m a _burger man,_  Linda. I work in a cow-flesh medium.” He’s starting to run out of steam. He sighs and leans against the counter, next to the sink. 

“Dad, I miss beef as much as the next omnivore,” says Tina, “but the truth is, even if we find some, livestock is impractical. The crops you use to feed a cow could yield something like six times as many meals as the cow itself. Even if some livestock animals have survived, I don't think it will be practical to eat meat for decades."

It’s almost a year since the plague hit, and it seems to have burned itself out. There hasn’t been a single case in the area in over two months. As Dad hoped, people have been arriving at a steady pace from about a 50-mile radius, drawn by our lights, which are visible from tens of miles away at night. By some fluke, we seem to be the only place in the vicinity with electricity. And if, as promised, Teddy and his crew manage to install solar panels on every unit in the neighborhood, it should stay that way.

From what we’ve been able to gather, most survivors in the Northeast fled west with their families, seeking less populated areas where they believed they would be less likely to catch the plague. Of course, the plague didn’t work that way, so surely most of them died anyway.

Still, we’re up to about 300 residents... 

  


TINA

Sorry to interrupt, but I need to jump in for a second, get something off my chest. 

Despite the population doubling in the last three months, I still haven’t found a suitable guy anywhere near my age. 

There are several late-teen boys among the new arrivals, but three of them are gay, one is asexual (which I totally respect, but _goddammit_ ), two met Susmita about five minutes after they got here and it was three-way love at first sight (maybe there’s room for one more in their little family. I’m going to work that angle, but I think it’s too soon to bring it up).

A whopping eleven of them arrived with girlfriends already in tow - there must be something about wandering the earth, struggling to survive the Apocalypse, that serves as a romantic backdrop for any possible relationship. Four have "cougar" fixations, much to the delight of what's left of the local “MILF” community - who knows, maybe they’ll get over it eventually. And one, Victor, is a trans boy, who’s really sweet, and cute as hell, and I’m hardly transphobic - though the matter of his, um, equipment, could be a bit of an issue from a purely mechanical perspective. 

But guess what: He’s just not attracted to me. He feels terrible about it, but there it is. I’m hoping that as we get to know each other better, and he discovers how awesome I am, an attraction will develop. Plus, not that many girls will be able to deal with the trans thing. He may wind up with me for lack of other options. But I really don’t want to get into a mercy-fuck based relationship if I can avoid it.

I’ve been approached by several older men - most of whom were actually really nice and not at all creepy. But I’m just not comfortable with a 20 or 30 year age gap. I want a boyfriend, not a manfriend. 

Most upsetting, I think, is that Teddy has been gazing at me longingly, flirting with me - or at least exhibiting an odd combination of behaviors he clearly thinks is flirting.

It’s sad, really. Teddy is one of the nicest guys in the world and truly loves my whole family. I think he’d take a bullet for any of us without a second thought. Maybe anyone in the town, maybe even anyone in the world.

And over the past year, having become mostly a vegetarian for lack of other options, he’s slimmed down, and is becoming something like the hardbody he was as a young man. He’s clean-shaven, dresses better, and just generally cleans up really well. I’m proud of him.

Still... [shudder]. 

  
OK, Louise, back to you.

 

LOUISE

Um, thanks for that update on your horny desperation. Or your desperate horniness.

  
TINA

I’m also really _lonely_ , Louise. I’d sell my soul to have what you and Rudy have. Don’t rub it in.

 

LOUISE 

Sorry. I’m kind of a bitch sometimes. In fact, it's my superpower. But I swear, I’m on your side. I want you to find a guy almost as bad as you do.

 

TINA

Thanks. I appreciate it. Anyway, you were saying...

 

LOUISE

I mean, it's only fair - I want to hear what  _you_ sound like having sex.

  


TINA

So do I, Louise.

 

Aaaaaaaanyway..,.

 

LOUISE

The point I was making is that the more the population grows, the greater the demand for food. And eventually - sooner than later - the canned goods are going to run out. We’re raiding nearby towns - and occasionally bringing in a new resident or two along with the food - but it’s not a sustainable approach over the long term. 

Eventually, the canned stuff will go bad - particularly if it’s been through a few sweltering summers in unairconditioned supermarkets, stored at well above “room temperature.” 

We have to grow our own food. I’m guessing we’ve got a year or two to get our agriculture groove on, or we’re screwed.

Dad knows this, and that’s probably what’s really bugging him, so he's distracting himself with his burger rant. 

 

“Oh God, Lin. What if we run out of food?” Dad sits down and toys with his breakfast - baked beans and... well, nothing else. It’s not even one of those baked beans with bacon mixtures. That delicacy ran out months ago.

Still, baked beans are pretty good. Tasty. But that’s not enough. 

I’m not a big eater, but some days, I think about Dad’s amazing burgers, and I want to cry. I swear, if Moolissa was here right now, I’d slaughter him with my bare hands and run his muscle tissue through the grinder while it was still warm.

I know - “thanks for the image,” but what can you do? Meat is murder.

Sweet, juicy murder.

 

Tina has finished her serving, and seconds. She rinses her plate and says “I’m going over to Victor’s. I don’t have any plans for the day, but I’ll be at the meeting tonight.”

“Sure,” says Dad. He’s mostly calmed down - he’s even nibbling at his baked beans. “Have fun.”

As an afterthought, he adds “If you feel like taking a walk in the park today, maybe spend some time by the lake. Teddy swears he heard frog sounds there yesterday. Maybe we can catch a bunch, cook up some legs. I hear they taste like chicken.”

“OK, first of all, gross," says Tina. "Second of all, frog legs have less meat than chicken wings. If we caught a hundred frogs, we could maybe have a cookout and feed ourselves, Gene’s crew, and Teddy, with enough leftovers for a nice snack the next day.

"Third of all, gross.”

Dad doesn’t have much fight in him - particularly over amphibian meat. He sighs and says “Fine. Teddy was probably just hearing things anyway.”

Mom, tipsy but still mentally present, changes the subject to a happy one. “Hey, why don’t you invite Victor over for dinner? It’ll be fun!”

Tina smiles but she’s wary. “OK - just promise you won’t embarrass me.”

“Whaaat? That’s crazy? How would I embarrass you?”

“Well, for one thing, you're obsessed with the idea that Victor’s deadname was Victoria...”

“Oh, come on,” says Mom, chuckling. “It’s just so perfect. Victor/Victoria, like the movie.”

“It’s mildly amusing at best, Mom,” says Tina, now on edge, “and you could promise up and down not to ask about it, and mean it, but after a few drinks, you won’t be able to stop yourself.”

“Not true. Not true at all,” Mom insists. “And besides, even if I did, I’m sure he’ll see the humor.”

Tina strides up to Mom, eyes blazing. She’s grown like 5 inches in as many years. She’s still much shorter than Mom, but close enough to look her in the eyes with her head tilted slightly up. She speaks softly but with an intensity that’s a little over the top. “You. Do. _Not_ discuss a trans person’s deadname. You just don’t. I don’t care how benign your intentions are, it’s like the n-word. It’s intrinsically hurtful, and you do _not_ have permission to use it or talk about it.”

Though her words are reasonable, Tina's tone is terrifying. There's murder in her voice. I’ve never seen this side of her. I’d actually be proud of her if she wasn’t directing it at our own mother. 

Dad tries to diffuse the tension. “Tina...”

But she goes on. “...You're disinhibited when you're tipsy and an imbecile when you're drunk, which is most of the time these days, and I. Don’t. Trust. You.”

Mom is visibly shaken.

“Tina, that’s enough!” Dad’s hard-won calm has evaporated. I’m pretty pissed at her myself. 

“Seriously, T,” I say, “Are you on crack or something? Since when do you go from zero to bitch in under ten seconds?”

Tina offers no explanation. “Don't enable her, Louise. She’s a stone drunk. I don’t think she’s been sober in a year”

It's Mom's turn to stare down her daughter. “How dare you,” she growls. “It's nice that you and your hymen got through the Apocalypse intact...” I've never heard Mom use anatomical terms, particularly to be hurtful.

“You do realize I'm not happy about the hymen part, right?”

“...but some of us weak, sensitive types need to get a little altered to deal with the _end of the fucking world!_ ”

I’ve also never heard her use a curse word stronger than “dick.” Based on her first attempt to get “Hey Good Cookin’” punished by the FCC several years back, I’d have sworn she literally didn’t know any.

Dad is too burnt out to step in. His wife and his firstborn have been bickering intensely for the past year. This storm will pass, things will be back to normal in a day or two, and we'll all have died a little more inside.

 

“How dare _you!_ ,” Tina roars. “You think I’m _intact?_ I screamed my throat bloody every day for nine months and cried until I had to wring my pillow out like a dishrag! I watched most of my friends die in agony or by suicide! And you think I’m intact?!

“I killed _Zeke!_ Gave him a morphine overdose so he wouldn't have to go through the transition! We were going to be lovers and I had to kill him!” 

Tina is sobbing. Mom, deflated, slumps in her seat at the kitchen table. She and Dad hadn’t known about Zeke.

Dad grabs the bridge of his nose, reconsiders, and buries his face in his hands. “Oh my god.”

“He died in my arms and they buried him in a mass grave, you fucking _bitch!_ ”

OK, this isn’t Mom and Tina’s usual fight; this is a cataclysm. Whatever’s driving it, it must have been building up for months, maybe years. I feel like, as the only person in the kitchen currently of sound mind, I should step in and do a little forced arbitration. But I can’t think of anything helpful to say. 

So I go with something unhelpful. I stand up on my chair and shout “Shut up! Both of you just shut up and calm the fuck down! The kitchen is full of sharp objects, and I don’t want to spend all afternoon scrubbing blood off the linoleum.”

Mom’s face is buried in her hands, but I see Tina actually stare at the cutlery drawer for about ten seconds.

Breaking the silence, I say “Mom, Tina’s right - you’re incapable of discretion after a couple of drinks.”

Mom hisses.

Tina is wearing a smirk that is just begging to be slapped across the room. “And Tina, you’re being a cunt. Drop it and apologize or I will _personally_ pack a suitcase with your clothes and your poor, overworked vibrator, physically kick you out of the house, and change the locks!”

_Good work, Louise. Way to de-escalate the conflict. For my next trick, I’ll solve our roach problem by setting fire to the house and watching it burn down, screaming “Black flag, motherfuckers!”_

“Don’t bother. I’ll pack up myself, and go move in with Victor. Or Susmita. Or anyone who’ll take me.”

She stalks off, leaning in as she brushes by me, hard enough to nearly knock me off my chair.

She enters her room and slams the door. There is the sound of drawers being roughly opened and slammed shut. Occasionally, something breaks or shatters. Throughout the entire process, I hear Tina’s old “huh! huh! huh! huh!” panic attack sound, which I haven’t heard in years.

There is the long, plastic screech of a suitcase zipper being closed. After a moment of quiet, Tina’s door opens slowly and she strides serenely down the hall - though it’s clear that her serenity is costing her, big time, to maintain. She pulls her rolling suitcase behind her without addressing us, lifts the suitcase by the handle to carry it down the stairs and out the door to what I’m sure she thinks is a brave new world.

Mom and I haven’t moved the entire time. I’m still standing on my chair, Mom’s still slumped in hers, staring blankly. Dad has slumped down and is sitting on the floor. 

Rudy, who somehow managed to sleep through all of that - probably because I wore him out last night with a trip around the world and then some - shuffles in, yawning. 

He stares at our little tableau, struggling to parse what he’s seeing.

“What’d I miss?”


	2. Chapter 2

RUDY

I know what you’re wondering. It’s okay. It’s natural to be curious. 

I’ll tell you - just don’t tell Louise I did. I’d be dead before I hit the floor. 

So - does Louise keep the bunny ears on when we do it?

Well, sometimes. 

The first time, she took them off along with everything else. That may not sound like much, but it was incredibly brave. She was showing me she was willing to be completely vulnerable with me. That she trusted me with more than her life; she trusted me with her soul.

She was already naked before me - which made me so dizzy I forgot to be self-conscious about my own nudity. We were sitting up, criss-cross applesauce, in her little bed, facing each other, our knees touching. I reached out to touch her face, but she stopped my hand.

She stared into my eyes so intensely I wondered if she was actually looking through my skull at something on the far wall. I met her gaze. I knew this - whatever it was - was important. 

Slowly, she reached up over her head, her hand shaking. 

I realized what she was about to do. My eyes widened, as did her sweet, faltering grin. 

“Louise,” I said, “you don’t have to...”

But with her other hand, she placed her finger on my lips. “Shh.”

I have to admit, I was pretty choked up. I may have wept. Maybe that sounds weird, but understand: for Louise, this was more intimate an act than welcoming me inside her, as she later did.

She grasped one of the pink fabric ears of her hat. It vibrated in her shaking hand. Slowly, slowly, she lifted the hat from her head. When it was completely clear, her hand ceased its shaking, but she seemed unsure what to do next - or perhaps unsure if she was ready to lose contact with the object altogether.

Finally, she closed her eyes, swung her arm slowly to her side, and let the hat drop to the floor.

She did not open her eyes again immediately. I think she wanted to let me look - even stare - at her unadorned head for a few moments without feeling embarrassed to be staring.

I don’t know what I expected to see. Some awful scar from a childhood injury? Horns? A spinning yellow polygon hovering over her, revealing the awful truth that she was actually a Sim? A rat that controlled her movements by pulling on her hair? A tattoo of Tattoo from Fantasy Island getting a tattoo of _her,_ in a tattoo parlor on Tatooine? A tiny transdermally implanted video screen playing Rick Astley on infinite loop? What lay beneath the security blanket she wore on her head?

It was none of the above, of course, nor anything else unusual. Just completely normal black hair. A bit matted down, maybe. 

I reached out again, and touched it. Louise inhaled sharply, then purred as I stroked her hair and played with it, scritching her scalp and gently swirling her hair around until it was frizzy and wild. It was clearly giving her an inordinate amount of physical pleasure - which made sense; the only touch she'd ever felt on the top of her head was her own, when she was washing her hair. Of course the skin there would be incredibly sensitive.

She moved to me and wrapped her legs around my waist. Most guys in my position - long time listener, first-time caller - would pray they didn't nut right on the spot.

I, for my part, prayed to maintain consciousness. I was several levels past overwhelmed and worried that my overclocked CPU would melt at any moment. 

She pressed her upper body against mine until our flesh touched at every possible point, and rested her head on my shoulder. 

I could spend an hour just telling you what it felt like - the joyful, exquisite feeling of skin against skin. The sensation of her tiny breasts against my own chest ( _man, I thought, we really are_ way _too young for this_ ). Her feet brushing against my buttocks, delighting me more than I would have anticipated; the heat radiating from between her legs, or was I just imagining it, a fire there was but one way to extinguish.

But more than all that, an inexpressible sense of wellbeing and... _rightness_ . Of being _home_ , being accepted, being adored. 

Being human. 

It took every mental resource I had to take in, appreciate, and memorize these feelings. But somehow I intuited that she didn’t want me to take the next step yet, so I ignored the deafening sound of the DNA in every one of the trillions of cells in my body screaming at me to get on with it. 

I was right. She murmured “Don’t stop.”

So I continued to run my hand through her hair while my free hand caressed her back and tentatively explored more sensitive regions.

“Mmmmmmmmmmm...” Now she was humming into my neck, and breathing faster and more deeply. I was glad she wasn’t looking at me, because I knew I had the most foolish, dorky smile on my face as I realized just how much pleasure I was giving her. Inside, I was gazing calmly into a shaft of golden light blazing down from heaven. On the outside, I was grinning like a maniac, and probably going cross-eyed as well.

Despite all that, it was a complete surprise when she suddenly pressed her open mouth hard against my neck to stifle her moan and writhed and shuddered in my arms for... well, I didn’t have a stopwatch on me, but it was a good long time before her spasms subsided and she leaned back to look at me, smiling gloriously. 

And it’s a good thing it lasted that long, because I was remarkably slow to figure out what was happening: We’d discovered a new erogenous zone. 

She’d had a scalp-gasm.

Stated that way, it sounds funny. OK, it _is_ funny. But the experience of it was deep and powerful and profoundly moving. I had made Louise feel wonderful.

 _No - grow up, Steiblitz. You made her_ come. 

Louise - my oldest and best friend, my favorite insurmountable challenge, my adorable tormentor, my fiercest defender. The girl I was determined to understand if it took a lifetime - and hoped it would.  

Louise - that crackling electrical haze of anger, sarcasm and aggression enshrouding an impossibly dense core of kindness with some mysterious singularity of pain at its center. 

Louise, my love.

I’d given her the most beautiful feeling on earth - other than the way it made me feel to do so. She had shown me her most secret place, trusted me to treat it kindly, and I had. I had made her feel safe enough to share her most intimate, most vulnerable possible moment with me. 

Of course, part of me just basked in the knowledge that I was hot shit. I was naked in bed with my girlfriend and I’d just given her an amazing orgasm. I was The Man. I was...

Shaking. Being shaken. _Odd. How should I respond? I'll give it a minute, and see what happens._

Without warning, Louise leapt off the bed. I couldn’t imagine why. I tried to figure out what was going on, but I couldn’t think very clearly. Even when I saw her rummage through my backpack and pull out my rescue inhaler, I couldn’t connect the dots.

She jumped back on the bed and shoved the inhaler in my face. When I didn’t respond (what was she expecting me to do? It was so confusing!), she yelled something I couldn’t make out, because it was coming from a million miles away, plus there was the matter of the thin, high pitched ringing in my ears getting louder... How was I supposed to think? 

The feeling of a jet of albuterol and accelerant hitting the back of my throat triggered the expected automatic response. I inhaled deeply and coughed until I nearly puked, speeding air to my shriveled lungs. I wasn’t actually having an asthma attack, but it did the job.

When she was sure I was going to live, Louise smiled sweetly at me and slapped me so hard I went cross-eyed again. 

Honestly, she should have waited a few minutes first. My brain was still rebooting, and was only 34% of the way through a Windows update I hadn’t agreed to. I simply couldn’t parse the meaning of the attack. In fact, I wasn’t even present enough to question it. Smile - slap - ouch. OK, that’s a thing that happens, apparently. 

I didn’t like it, but I sure liked looking at the naked chick who did the ouch thing, so I spoke the first full sentence to form in my head, which turned out to be “I like boobies.”

Louise smiled and shook her head, chuckling. “And I love a doofus who forgets to breathe when his girlfriend comes.”

“Well, you do take my breath away,” I said, raising an eyebrow. 

Louise, aghast, said, “Just for that, I really should slap you again - but after the other one, it would probably dislocate your jaw.”

“Yeah, that's a genuine possibility,” I said. My cheek still stung vividly from the first one. “By the way, what was that for?”

“It was for being so stupid you nearly died on me. You literally forgot to breathe.”

I grinned sheepishly. “Fair enough.”

I leaned in and kissed her sweetly for an eon or two - careful to remember to keep breathing. When I was sure she had been thoroughly kissed - even by our impossibly high standards - I leaned back and asked: “So, um, what now?”

By way of reply, she grabbed my shoulders and flopped down on her back, taking me with her. I found myself poised above her, holding my upper body over her with my arms. I once again felt the heat radiating from what, I suddenly recalled, her mother so absurdly referred to as her “yum-yum.”

I'd have laughed out loud if not for the distracting fact that my erection was resting on top of it, aching to get on with its damn job already.

“Wait,” Louise blurted, fumbling to open the drawer of her bedside table, eventually withdrawing a box of condoms I later found out she had swiped from her father's supply, which was now stored in the cupboard above the refrigerator, no longer necessary since Linda had entered menopause two years before.

(Tina also had a stash she'd pilfered, which sat, unused, in her underwear drawer, bitterly mocking her. Poor Tina.)

Anyway, that was a weight off my mind.

I closed my eyes, silently thanked the universe for making this moment possible, and...

 

Whoa. Um... sorry to interrupt myself at this particular point, but really, nothing surprising followed: fumbling with condom, penetration, joy, missionary - remedial but reliable - more joy, nearly simultaneous orgasms (okay, that’s pretty surprising for our first time), me first, followed quickly by Louise, followed by temporary deafness, followed by... well Tina picked up the story from that point.

Damn. I hadn't intended to get into this in so much, um, detail. 

I guess I should round out the answer to the initial question:

So most of the time, Louise removes the bunny ears; but sometimes, when we're feeling mildly kinky (which is as kinky as we ever get), Louise does leave the bunny ears on, as she always did in my fantasies, all of which (and more) have since come true.

I have never been happier - and the fact that this all unfolded as quickly and beautifully as it did because of a plague that killed 98% of the human race leaves me profoundly conflicted. I know Louise feels the same way.

And there's only one way to come to terms with our self-recriminations: an intensive program of sex therapy.

You gotta do what you gotta do.

 

LOUISE

Rudy? Sweetie? Would you come here for a moment? We need to have a little chat before I murder you.

  
RUDY

Oh, crap. This is gonna be bad... What’d I do with that cyanide capsule?

  


LOUISE

Oh, don’t worry honey, it’ll be swift and painless.

  


RUDY

[Sigh] Fine. Let’s get this over with.  


 

LOUISE

Good boy.

So, let’s review: what did I tell you about sharing our most intimate, private, delicate moments with everyone?

 

RUDY

Uh, not to do it.

  


LOUISE

Correct. And what did I tell you about providing wank fodder to posterity’s pedo perverts?

  


RUDY

Not to do it.

  


LOUISE

Exactly. And Rudy, this is very important. It counts for two-thirds of your grade: what did I tell you about discussing what was under my hat?

  
RUDY

...

  


LOUISE

Well?

  


RUDY

... not to...

  


LOUISE

 _NOT TO DO IT!!!_ Are you insane?! Do you have a death wish?!

Do you... Do you... [sobbing] Do you respect my right to privacy? At all? Our sex life is not for public consumption! You wanna mention my screaming orgasms? Fine - everyone in the tri-county area hears them at least five times a day. 

But the rest? No fucking way. It’s a hidden document, AES256 encrypted, get it?

  


RUDY

Yeah, _I_ do, but I don’t think most people are familiar with encryption algorith...

  


LOUISE

AND YOU JUST POSTED IT ON CREATIVE COMMONS, YOU FUCKING TWAT!!! [more sobbing]

  


RUDY

Louise, I’m sorry. Truly, I’m sorry. I mean, “sorry” doesn’t even cover it. And I didn’t mean to overshare like that. It just...

  


LOUISE

Give me one good reason I shouldn’t kill you where you stand.

  


RUDY

Uh... Hmm... Tough one... Oh! I got it: because you love me, for all my little foibles?

  


LOUISE

FOIBLES?! ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?

 

[15 seconds of hyperventilating, followed by 20 seconds of meditation]

 

[calmly] So, tell me: what possible reason could you have for broadcasting every little detail of our first time? How did you justify it to yourself?

  


RUDY

Well... I guess you could say it was... “artistically valid?”

  


LOUISE

No, I really don’t think I _could_ say that. Also, what the fuck are you talking about?

  


RUDY

I... I mean... 

[inhaler hit]

I mean it’s not about the sex, it’s...

 

LOUISE

Seriously? That whole long sex scene wasn’t about sex? 

OK, I’ll bite. What was that extended work of child porn actually about?

  


RUDY  
  
It wasn't pornography! It was about who we are - who you are. How strong and brave you are, and how that moment in our lives transformed us both. About the courage it took for you to remove your bunny ears for me. How humbled I was - and still am - to be loved and trusted by the most amazing person I’ve ever known. How much we mean to each other. 

If I’d just said it like that - just ticked off my impressions like bullet points, it wouldn’t have had any more impact than a shopping list. It would be the facts, but not the Truth - you know, with a capital T?

You said that we were doing this so that future generations will understand the real, human experience of being who we are, when we are. So they’d know more about the apocalypse than just dates and statistics. 

It’s so important...

  
LOUISE

Rudy.

 

RUDY

In all of history, 100 billion human beings have lived and died. How many are remembered as people? As individuals? How many have gotten to tell their stories?

  


LOUISE

Rudy...

  


RUDY

Does it really matter if some creep in the 35th century gets a boner from...

  


LOUISE

Rudy!!!!! 

Okay. It’s okay. I get it. It makes me want to curl up under my bed in a fetal position, but I get. I understand. I even agree, intellectually.

So... I’m going to let you live.

  


RUDY

OhthankGod.

  


LOUISE

And in your infinite gratitude for my infinite mercy, you will be my slave for a week, Brady Bunch-style. Do my chores, cater to my every whim, however preposterous. In bed and out.

  


RUDY

I hate to say this, but that actually sounds great. And pretty much the same as our normal arrangement.

  


LOUISE

I don't think you realise what being my sex slave entails. I have a lot of ideas.

And Rudy?

  


RUDY

Yeah?

  


LOUISE

If you share the tiniest detail of it; if you blab about it to anyone, you’ll have to kill them. Then, _I’m_ going to kill _you_. 

  


RUDY

Got it.

  


LOUISE

Slowly and painfully. You will suffer. You will pray for death, my darling. 

  


RUDY

I get it.

  


LOUISE

...Oh,  _Do_ you?

  


RUDY

Vow of silence. If anyone finds out we don’t spend the rest of our lives celibate, they won’t hear it from me.

  


LOUISE

[chuckling] I like your attitude, but you can dial it back a notch. I don’t care if they know if we fuck. Or even when and under what circumstances. It’s one of our major talents: we are really good at having sex with each other.

Just let’s stick to the dates and statistics from now on, my love.

  


RUDY

Can do.

  


LOUISE

Or I will tear out your heart and shove up your cute little ass. 

  


RUDY 

Perfectly reasonable. I’ll draw up the contract, sign a waiver, and have it notarized.

  


LOUISE

[sigh] No need. Just don’t fuck up, okay.

  


RUDY

Deal.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I generally do, I'm writing this with a general outline in mine but working out the details as I go along.
> 
> As a result, I occasionally have to go back and revise earlier chapters to support details in newer ones.
> 
> In this case, I'm going to have to go back to chapter one and clarify the severity of Linda's drinking problem. I had established that she was improving a bit, but I find that that's not serving the story.
> 
> There are also a few more minor details I need to fix, but nothing that particularly affects the story.
> 
> With that in mind, enjoy chapter three.

GENE  
  
Scott and I are having an intimate moment when there's an insistent knock at the door.   
  
"Gene? Gene?" It's Courtney's voice. Dammit, I told her I was having Scott TimeTM this morning.

“Yeah?”

"Gene! Sorry to bother you, but Tina's here and she's having a breakdown."   
  
Crap. "You're her friend; can't you comfort her for a while?"   
  
"It's a family thing. She really needs you."   
  
Courtney's not the type to shirk her duties as a friend. If she says Tina needs me, Tina needs me.   
  
I turn to Scott, who is already putting his clothes back on - a damn shame, because he's gorgeous; way out of my league, frankly.   
  
"It's okay,” he says. “Go take care of your sister."  
  
Scott's a gem. It's not just his looks - his beautiful, ginger complexion, his sensitive, red-bearded face and his perfect bod. He's kind and patient and compassionate. The more survivors there are like him, the better the new world will be.   
  
"Thanks, man," I say. "Raincheck?”   
  
He gives me The LookTM and says "you better believe it."   
  
Sadist - he knows The LookTM only turns me on even more.   
  
"I'll be right there," I yell to Courtney, but there's no reply. She probably went downstairs to tend to Tina while I get myself together.   
  
I throw on my shorts (I can't find my boxers, so fuck it, I'm going commando) and a t-shirt. On my way out, I go to Scott, who can change gears almost instantly and is now laser-focused on his computer screen, creating something beautiful in Photoshop.   
  
I sneak up behind him and hug him gently. He doesn't look up from his laptop, but says "Love you."   
  
"Love you too," I say.

From the top of the stairs, I can hear Tina sobbing, and occasionally breaking into her old freakout noise - “huh! huh! huh! huh! huh!” I feel bad for her, but it does bring back warm memories of the past, when she was Louise's age, and things like Tammy stealing her erotic friend fiction to read out loud at school felt like the end of the world.

Okay, bad choice of words. Just as well; it brings me back to the present.

As I enter the large storefront space we've set up as an extra living area - with a few discrete, private areas full of soft surfaces for sleeping or... whatever - Courtney is tucking Tina in on one of the couches, covering her with a blanket. Courtney says “Gene's on his way. You can tell him about it,” and the sobbing segues into another old Tina sound, a long, sustained “uhhhhhhhh.” She has run out of energy, and her panic is settling into despair.

Courtney is stroking her hair and murmuring “it's okay. You're safe, you're with people who love you. You can rest now. If you need anything, just let me know and you'll get it. Oh - here's Gene.” 

I'm so proud of her. She's grown up so much. She was always a sweetheart, but back when we first became acquainted, it was hard to tell because she was so. fucking. annoying.

Even later on, when our relationship progressed from me using her to gain access to her dad's Gear Heaven (a major dick move on my part) to genuine, mutual like-like, she was a pretty frivolous creature. (As was I, honestly.)

But I guess there's something about living through the Apocalypse that grows you up fast. Post-Apocalypse Courtney is soulful and compassionate and nurturing - I can imagine having kids with her someday. She'll be a wonderful mother - if she wants to be.

All of this flashes through my mind in an instant as I go to her and kiss her gently, but with an intimation of the great passion I feel thinking of all we've been through and how she's grown as a person.

Plus, I'm all worked up from my interrupted Scott TimeTM

She senses my mood. Her eyes widen for a moment before they close and she smiles into my kiss, and now I'm really conflicted. I really want to finish what Scott and I started, but at the same time, I want to make love to Courtney as soon as logistically possible. 

Oh, the conundrums inherent in being a polyamorous bisexual. 

All in all, there are worse problems to have - like, for example, whatever Tina’s dealing with.

I crouch down next to the sofa to talk to her; then I think the better of it and just sit on the floor. I’ve dropped a bunch of weight in the past year (who hasn’t) and built up some strength, but I haven’t exactly been working on my core. I’m good for about 20 seconds of crouching before I need physical therapy.

“Hey, sis, wanna tell me about it?”

She turns her head to face me, and I can tell immediately that this is bad - not “Jimmy-Junior-dumped-me-again” bad; "Hide-all-the-pills-and-razors" bad. What the hell just happened?

In her odd, flat monotone, she says “I had a fight with Mom.”

Seriously? That’s it?

“You fight with Mom all the time, T,” I say.

She rolls her eyes - a little unfairly, in my opinion. What am I, psychic? “No, you don’t get it. I had _the_ fight with Mom. I called her out on her drinking. Told her I didn’t trust her around Victor.”

Oh, boy. The drinking thing. Definitely a sore spot. Mom doesn’t drink “just for fun,” anymore. 

“So you tried to stage an intervention,” I say.

“No. But it just kind of went downhill from there. I’m replaying it in my head, and it was bad, but nothing either of us said was, like, “you’re-dead-to-me” horrible. But it wasn’t the words. We’ve just been driving each other nuts since it all fell apart.”

That was certainly true - it’s one of the reasons I welcomed the opportunity to move out of the Belcher residence. 

“Well, stress affects everyone differently,” I say, “and in the last year, we’ve all been through the most stress imaginable. The kind of stress that can change your personality - I mean, look at how the people around us have changed. Courtney has grown up; Jocelyn’s brain has come online and she turns out to actually be pretty smart; Dad is running the town, and doing a good job... and that’s just the people currently in a 50-foot radius.”

Tina sits up a little, enough to look me directly in the eyes, which she does with great intensity. There is a dangerous silence, which Tina finally breaks, asking “Have _I_ changed?”

That’s a good question - one I’d rather spend five or ten minutes thinking about before I answer. But I’ve got to wing it.

“I don’t know. I mean, not fundamentally, I think. You’re sad most of the time, and your hope doesn’t spring eternal the way it used to. You’re world-weary and depressed... but we’re all going through all of those things, all of the time. Who wouldn’t, under the circumstances?”

Tina flops back down and turns away from me to lie on her side facing the back of the couch.

“So what’s different?” she asks. “Louise is the one who always had conflicts with Mom. Now she actually gets along with her - defends her, even - and _I_ can’t look at her without getting nauseous.”   
  
“Well, I think Louise gets along with Mom better now because the really heavy drinking brings out her dark side, and she can relate to that.” I ponder that for a moment. “Maybe that’s it. Mom was always the one you went to for a little positivity - or a lot - when you were down. There was nothing she couldn’t get enthusiastic about. She was a human safety net. Now she’s more of a pit of despair half the time, and you feel betrayed.” 

Man, I’m smart. “As a mama’s boy, I can totally relate. I’ve been grieving over that myself, now that I think of it; I guess it just got lost in the shuffle of all the other stuff I’m grieving.”

“You think that’s it? I just resent her because I feel betrayed? That doesn’t seem like enough to account for all the hostility.”

Hmm. “Well... maybe ‘betrayed’ isn’t the right word. I think you feel abandoned - and that’s one of the most devastating feelings you can have, especially when it’s a parent who abandons you.”

Tina is silent for a long moment; then she sits up. She is clearly shaken, but also somehow reassured by a moment of clarity.

In her usual monotone, she says, “so it's all my fault.”

“What? No - I mean, Mom really has been checked out for a long time, just when we all needed each other the most. Plus, she's drinking herself to death, and there aren't exactly any rehab programs we could send her to.”

Tina sighs. “It's that simple, huh? I've got abandonment issues.”

“Well,” I say, “I mean there's probably other stuff going on, but yeah.”

Tina puts her head in her hands and sobs. “Oh god, Louise is right - I _am_ a cunt.”

“Look, you don't ...” I stopped cold. “She really called you that?”

 

“And a bitch. And I called _Mom_ a bitch. A 'fucking bitch,' to be precise. Uhhhhhhhhhhh... what the hell is going on? Huh! Huh! Huh! Huh! Huh! Huh!“

This is getting out of hand. “Tina, stop it. Give it 24 hours and it’ll all blow over and everything will be back to normal.”

“No. Not this time. I mean, Mom’ll get over it - it’s all a blur to her anyway at this point. But I won’t. Maybe I handled it badly, but I don’t think we have a relationship anymore.”

Tina is silent for a moment. There are things I want to say, but it’s clear she's working something out in her head.

“It’s like she’s a crawler, Gene. She’s all twisted up, and I don’t know if the person I love is even in there anymore. I... I can’t be around that. And I can’t save her, not when the truth is she actually wants to die. And to be honest, maybe that makes her the only sane one around here.”

Tina is still speaking in her usual affectless manner, but tears are streaming down her cheeks. 

Yeah, this is bad. Whatever else is going on, it’s a good thing she’s leaving the nest. Clearly, Mom’s death wish is contagious, and Tina’s not immune. I’ve got to do something.

 

“Look, T, you can stay here as long as you want. It’s a little crowded - you won’t have much privacy - but it’ll be great having you around. I miss you. So do Courtney and Jocelyn, and I’d love it if you got to know Scott better.”

She smiles - just barely, but with all the warmth I remember - and says “Thanks. I think I need to put some more space between me and Mom, and I don’t want to be a, what, a fifth wheel? Sixth? But I miss you, too. I could hang out for a while.”  
  
I’m stunned by just how delighted I am to have my favorite sad sack back in my home, in my daily life. Maybe I can convince her to move in permanently - we’re almost done finishing the basement, adding carpeting and drywall, dividing it into two small bedrooms and a living room, so there will soon be a reasonable amount of space for the number of residents we have and a few more applicants. 

(One of the rooms will be heavily soundproofed, and we’re going to invite Louise and Rudy to move into that one, or at least use it for their trysts. Don’t tell anyone - I want it to be a surprise.)

 

LOUISE 

Um, Gene, you still don’t get how this works, do you?

 

RUDY

Yeah, I almost got killed that way one chapter ago. You gotta focus, man. 

 

GENE

Meh. I’ll take my chances.

 

LOUISE

Never change, large brother.

 

RUDY

And thanks, by the way. That’s awesome.

 

LOUISE

Yeah, thanks. 

 

TINA

Same here. Like I said, I think I want more than one wall between me and Mom - but the offer is tempting. I’ll think about it.

 

GENE

Yay! This is gonna be great... though it occurs to me that leaving Mom and Dad alone together could be bad for them, particularly Dad, who’s been using Tina and Louise as a buffer between himself and his deteriorating wife. Who’s abandoning who?

 

TINA

"Whom."

 

GENE

Grammar Nazi. Just for that, you sleep on the couch tonight.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heh. Courtney starts out the chapter determined - as I am - to change the focus of the story away from the subject of sex for a while. But by the end, gets pulled back in, to her (and my) surprise and frustration. Nothing graphic, just a discussion of the topic and a hint of things to come (no pun intended).
> 
> Probably needs some editing, but I felt like posting it.

COURTNEY

OK, my turn now - ‘cause I don’t want you thinking all we do around here is have psychodramas and sex. I mean, we do, and it’s totally awesome - the sex, I mean - but we’re also productive members of society.

Gene and Scott are on Teddy’s crew, hauling in truck-fulls of solar panels and hardware from a warehouse in Edison and installing them on the roof of every inhabited unit. When whatever power plant we’re getting our juice from finally breaks down, we should be able to keep the lights on. 

It's hard physical work, and the exercise has done amazing things for Gene. He’s so much more energetic and focused. And damn has he got a hot bod now. 

Don’t get me wrong, I was totally into roly-poly Gene; but minus the baby-fat, Gene is, well, a Man. Strapping, burly, powerful -- but still a cuddle muffin. He thinks Scott's out of his league, but he's crazy...  


 

GENE

OK, now you're embarrassing me. Which is really hard to do, so, well done, but cut it out already.

  


COURTNEY

Shush. This is my narration and I'll say what I like, cutie-patootie.

So, anyway, yeah, Gene's got a totally bitchin bod now, and there's a lot of that going around, now that everyone's off the Modern American Diet and working their asses off making the town self-sufficient. 

Teddy and company are doing the solar conversion; a guy named Frank Bell from Camden is leading a team looking after our running water - I’m on that project; I’ll tell you more about it later; we’ve got a squad of half a dozen computer geeks, led by Susmita, maintaining a town intranet and a few major regional Google and streaming media nodes they tracked down, and doing everything they can to get us connected to the wider world if possible. We’ve got two medical doctors (an ENT and an OB-GYN) and two RNs, and they’re all working at a dead run, getting eleven volunteers up to speed on as many support disciplines as possible, as quickly as possible.

Almost every one of our 311 residents and counting is either on a team working on a major project or studying to master a new, needed discipline. 

It’s amazing to watch. Beautiful, really. Most of the town is still dark and uninhabited, but our little old-town section by the water is positively bustling. 

The streets are full of light and life at night. As tired as most of us are from our work, hardly an evening goes by without a large gathering on Ocean Drive. Musicians, mostly amateur - make a raucous, joyful noise, children run amok, people talk about the old days and about their dreams for the future. 

At any given moment, of course, at least eight or ten people are having emotional breakdowns. Sometimes I’m a comforter at large, sometimes I’m one of the people having a breakdown. But no one grieves alone who doesn’t want to. We’re a community. We support each other unreservedly.

If the world had been like this before the plague... well, actually, we’d still be almost extinct; but there would have been a lot less suffering up to that point. Fewer of us would have already been walking wounded before the dying started. 

We’re so fragile, we humans. I wonder if, this time around, we’ll figure out how to be tough enough to survive while staying kind enough to deserve to.

I should go check on Tina.

 

She’s sitting up, chatting with Jocelyn and Victor across our big, square coffee table and smiling, even laughing a bit. Good. 

I sent Jocelyn to get Victor earlier, while Tina was sleeping off her freakout. Good call. I think I’ll pat myself on the back for that. Pat-pat. 

Tina’s mostly listening as the other two have a very intelligent conversation about the importance of weaving tolerance and understanding of the complexities of human sexuality and gender identity into the fabric of the new society. 

To look at Victor, you’d think that there was nothing unusual about this scene. But it clearly registers with Tina - whose expression keeps flitting between shock and amusement - that the tall, blonde girl with the defiantly puffy hair and the Valley Girl inflections is engaging in a verbal exchange that would have made her glassy-eyed just to listen to a year ago. 

She might have even fallen asleep with her eyes open - I’ve seen her do it. It's creepy.

Of course, Victor never met the old Jocelyn, the one with no detectable personality and no thoughts deeper than “I want another blue burette,” or “I wonder if Tammy still has that booger in her nose from second period.”

 _That_ Jocelyn died about eight months ago when she had to euthanize Tammy whose parents couldn’t bring themselves to do it before their own suicides. 

When I went by Tammy’s house the next morning with the cleanup crew - her parents had informed us of their conditions and decision the previous day - I found Jocelyn standing over Tammy’s body, gun still in her hand. Dammit - she must not have been able to get Tammy to swallow the pills.

Her posture was slack, but her muscles were knotted and tense and hard as rocks - she had, I later found out, been standing that way, in shock, unmoving, for hours. 

For six weeks so far at that point, I had made it my business to go into my neighbors’ houses and retrieve their bodies. Sometimes individuals or couples, sometimes entire families. 

The first two bodies I collected - and I had to convince the others to let me - were those of my own parents. It... it felt like my duty. The last thing I could do for them.

I rolled each of them up in one of the Oriental rugs they’d spent enough on to put me through college, and then let the rest of the cleanup crew in to wrap them in plastic and load them into the truck that took them to the mass grave while I scream-vomited for ten minutes.

Then I hopped into the cab of the second truck and headed to the next cleanup.

I guess what I’m saying is, by the time I got to Tammy’s place, I was not easily shocked or horrified. But then, I rarely found living people on the scene. 

I could have taken seeing Tammy lying dead there - I’d already disposed of the remains of a few dozen people I actually liked and cared about. But seeing her friend standing, frozen, over her like that...

No. You know what? That’s not it. I’m just realizing it now. 

Look, I hated Tammy. She was an awful person, a stupid, spoiled brat with no redeeming qualities as far as I could tell. 

But that’s what did it. That’s what sent me running into the other room to scream into a couch cushion. She was horrible. She was, frankly, no great loss.

But she didn’t deserve this. 

No one did. None of the hundreds of corpses I’d pulled from the wreckage of their worlds and their lives deserved to die in horror and despair. 

I knew people worse than Tammy. People who were hateful and cruel, people the world was better off without. Even they deserved better than choosing between an agonizing death by plague or suicide.

I think a lot about the people in the World Trade Center on 9/11 who had to choose between burning to a crisp in the building or jumping a _thousand fucking feet_ to their deaths.

They were probably all good people. But even if one or more of them was an awful jerk who beat his kids or something, they deserved better than that - better than to have to force themselves to step out of a shattered 90th floor window and spend way, way too much time in unimaginable terror plummeting toward the ground to hit the concrete at terminal velocity and be liquefied.

I saw the video footage as a kid. Luckily, at the time, I couldn't comprehend what I was seeing. It was sad, awful, horrifying. But I couldn't possibly begin to truly empathize with what those poor people were experiencing.

"Why me?" "This can't be can't be real." "No no no no no no..." "God help me!" “ _Someone_ help me!” "I can't jump. I can't I can't I can't." 

_Hearts pounding, aching, racing racing racing, 200 beats per minute._

_Praying they would die right then and there of a heart attack. Anything, anything at all, to not have to jump._

_Regret, disbelief. All five stages of death - anger, denial, bargaining, depression, and maybe, just barely possibly, acceptance - playing out over the few minutes they had left as their leases on life ran out._

"Sweet Jesus, what did I do to deserve this?!"

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Short of the minuscule possibility that one of them was a rapist or murder, nothing. And maybe not even then. Cruel and unusual punishment.

Then they had to do it. They had to jump, or just let themselves fall. And fall and fall and fall and fall... And somehow, they did.

I know it's beyond my imagination. There's absolutely no way I can really conceive of what they experienced. Not even close. But I've spent hours trying, crying uncontrollably into my pillow, gripped by whatever degree of the reality of it I could force my mind to encompass.

I feel like I owe it to them. Like, somehow, if I think about it hard enough and long enough, in enough agonizing detail, they didn’t die alone. I spend entirely too much time in that place, in my mind, even now when I've dealt with another, more universal form of horror and mortal terror and loss and despair for over a year.

It all blurs together. 9/11, jump or burn; my grandmother taking her own life rather than suffer the final stages of terminal stomach cancer; dragging Andy Pesto's body out of his home with Ollie clinging to it, screaming... _wailing_ \- an unearthly sound that will haunt my dreams as long as I live; my parents sending me to stay with Gene overnight so I wouldn't be there when one shot the other then themselves. 

My parents. In all honesty, they were crass, shallow people. Sometimes, they could be downright creepy.

But if they had one deep emotion, it was their love for me. And I loved them. And, my God, they deserved so much better.

 _Oh, crap, I'm sorry!_ I wasn't planning to get into all that. It was cathartic, but a major digression. I know we're trying to stick to the present now.

  
LOUISE

It’s OK, Court. People need to know all of it. Hell, I need to know all of it - and I didn’t know a bunch of that stuff.

  


COURTNEY

Thanks. I’m surprised you turned up just now. I thought you were busy.

  


LOUISE

Well, with Rudy being my slave this week, I have a lot more free time. Isn’t that right, Chore Boy.

  


RUDY

Yes, mistress. 

  


LOUISE

Good boy. Now back to work.

  


RUDY

Already up to my elbows in it. Ta-ta for now, Courtney

  


COURTNEY

Well, well. You’ve got that boy well trained.

  


LOUISE

Hey, if you want any tips...

  


COURTNEY

Nah. Gene’s a free spirit, and I like it that way.

  


LOUISE

Suit yourself. I’m gonna take a nap. I’m not even sleepy - it’s the principle of the thing.

  


COURTNEY

Um... okey-dokey. Sweet dreams.

 

Anyway, sorry to be such a downer.

 

Now: Tina, Victor, and Jocelyn.

 

“Yeah, so it’s like, yeah,” Jocelyn is saying, “people just don’t get that gender, sexuality, romantic orientation - they're like totally non-binary. It’s not even a spectrum really. It’s like a three-dimensional matrix where all the points are color-coded and can slide in any direction or, change color, or, like, jump from one point to another, like with a teleporter. I’m all ‘Beam me up, Scotty now 'cause lately I’m heterosexual but homo-romantic.’ Tina, if you wanna cuddle, like, non-sexually, I’m totally into it.”

Tina chuckles. “Thanks for the offer. You’re so sweet. Make it a group hug with Victor and you’ve got a deal.”

“Count me in,” says Victor. He and Jocelyn pile on the couch with Tina in the middle.

Tina, a little reticent at first, settles into it and smiles blissfully. Interestingly, I swear I’m reading passion and attraction to Tina in Victor’s body language. Maybe he’s finally developing a little schwing for her. God, I hope so. The poor girl is just pining after him.

Their cuddle looks really inviting - plus, I have the ulterior motive of wanting a closer look at what’s going on with Victor - so I ask “room for one more.”

“Emotionally, yes,” says Victor. “Physically, no. Care to move this upstairs to the master bedroom, guys?”

That sounds wonderful. The California King mattress up there can comfortably accommodate all of us. I’m not sure where this is going, but I’m open-minded, and Goddammit, we’re back to sex stuff again.

Or are we? Jocelyn and I are both hetero - well, Jocelyn’s “homo-romantic" at the moment, but that’s probably not an issue. 

But what if Victor is into me or Jocelyn. It would kill Tina. Victor surely knows better than to indulge that attraction if it’s the case, but the sexual tension would be there. I, for one, think he’s dreamy - I like his slight androgyny - and he’s just such a cool guy. Plus, I have to admit, I find the question of the mechanics of sex with him intriguing.   
  
On top of that, there's the possibility that I’m right, and Victor really is attracted to Tina now (or maybe always was - as Zeke once said, “what a tangled-ass web we weave.” God, I miss him). How would that play out? What are we getting ourselves into?

I can see in Tina’s eyes that, whether or not she’s sensing what I’m sensing, the prospect of sharing a bed with Victor has her in a tizzy - she wants it so much, but if it doesn’t go the way she’s hoping, it’s going to hurt. A lot.

You know what? I’ll let the others decide if they want to give you all a play by play of the proceedings. I’m not going to contribute to the sexcapades, not with so much happening outside our bedroom walls.

I approach the people-pile as they’re getting up from the couch. I take someone’s hand - I think it’s Jocelyn’s - it’s too delicate to be Tina’s or Victor’s - and we lead each other upstairs.

This should be interesting. 

But please, someone, talk about something else. I mean, there’s a fishing expedition going out today - the first few came up empty, but maybe farther out? 

Also, Calvin Fischoeder is reopening Wonder Wharf, feeling he’s left the amusement park shut down for a respectful enough period of time. I think it’ll be great for all the kids who are new to the town. 

OK, shoo - we need some privacy.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I recently realized that there were several matters that I hadn't really addressed yet, loose threads (mainly Olly Pesto's story) and post-civilization survival issues (maintaining a supply of potable water; the curious absence of packs of feral animals, etc.).
> 
> So I figured "let's put on a show!" So what follows is a mixture of fun and feels that brings everything up to date.
> 
> Enjoy.

GENE

Ohmygod today is going to be so awesome!  
  
After weeks of study, research and seat-of-the-pants engineering, Susmita and her techie pals have made it possible for Seymour’s Bay to return to the social media era.  
  
The town has its own working Intranet and 100% wi-fi coverage; a consistent connection to the big chunks of the Web that are still functioning -- presumably on autopilot and thanks to multiple layers of redundancy; and as of this morning, we have our own TV/YouTube channel.

Most of the channel’s content is in the form of an archive of old video clips of local interest, but our flagship (and, for the moment, only) live show, “Post-Apocalypse Now with Gene and Courtney,” goes live in three minutes!

Now, I’m going to have to concentrate on what I’m doing on screen, so the rest of this chapter is going to be in transcript form.

And of course, you can always find archived episodes at youtube.com/postapocalypsenow, or at sbnj.gov/videos/panow/.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Post-Apocalypse Now - S1E1 - 09142025

 

_Opening Sequence: a montage of Seymour’s Bay scenery and landmarks, and people working hard, rebuilding the town and their lives, set to an upbeat, peppy instrumental theme (composed, recorded and preened over by Gene Belcher). After 30 seconds, the music and video montage fades to reveal the studio set._

_Gene Belcher and Courtney Wheeler are seated, center, in front of the high, floor to ceiling windows of the former Seymour’s Bay Yacht Club. The water sparkles behind them, and King’s Head Island is visible in the distance._ __  
  
Gene looks Courtney soulfully in the eyes, turns to the camera, and solemnly unfolds a piece of paper.

GB: Ladies and gentlemen, in honor of this auspicious occasion, I hope you’ll indulge me as I make a few serious, carefully composed remaaaaa... [Gene suddenly crumples the paper and tosses it over his shoulder] ...aaaaaaaahh, what the hell, let’s just wing this fucker!

CW: Jeez, Gene, you really had me going there. I mean, I knew you were going to do the bit with the paper, but I figured there was also a chance you’d actually go through with the speech. You know, as a sort of anti-Joke.

GB: It was a close thing. 

CW: OK, so, where to begin?

GB: With the big news, of course. The infrastructure news.

CW: Of course. So, I know "infrastructure" used to be one of those words that made people’s eyes glaze over. But I don’t think I have to explain why it’s now the most riveting topic in the world.

GB: Yeah. Infrastructure is sexier than ever, definitely the biggest topic trending on Twitter these days - or it would be if Twitter was still running. So just what is the big news in infrastructure?.

CW: Well, it’s the two biggies - electricity and water. Starting with electricity, as of this Saturday, every inhabited building in town has working solar power, thanks to the efforts of Seymour’s Bay’s resident handyman, Teddy... uh, Teddy... well, this is embarrassing -- I don’t know his last name.`

  
GB: It’s Szymankowszczyzna.

CW: Um, wow. Really? How do you spell that?

GB: If I knew that, I wouldn’t be able to pronounce it.

CW: OK, so, once more, for the pronunciation...

GB: Shi - man - skov - shiz - na. It’s Polish.

 

CW: Yeah. In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s the most Polish combination of sounds mathematically possible.

GB: Yep. About a millionth of a degree above Absolute Polish. So you see why he doesn’t go out of his way to tell people. Moving on...

CW: Right. So thanks to Teddy... Teddy S. and his crew, whenever whatever power plant we’re getting our juice from finally breaks down, we’ll still be able to keep the lights on and our devices running. 

You were on team Teddy, Gene. Care to tell us a little about the experience?

GB: Hell, yeah. You think I’d go through all that effort and not want to talk about it? Whaddaya think I am, _not_ a complete attention whore?

CW: Sorry. I don’t know what came over me.

 

GB: Anyway, In March, about six months into the, uh, recent unpleasantness, Teddy announces that he’s looking for about half a dozen able-bodied men and women to join him in bringing solar panels back here from a warehouse in Edison. 

Well, I figured that the “able-bodied” part disqualified me, but when Scott volunteered, I figured “hmm, 4 hours or so a day alone in a truck with Scott. I can adapt.”

CW: [giggles]

GB: So it was me, Scott, Marshmallow, Marsha Pogrebin, Jake Wallis, Teddy, of course -  and the Pesto twins at first, but Andy got sick about two weeks in and...

CW: Yeah.

GB: Yeah. Anyway, we found the 3 biggest pickup trucks in town and headed for Edison. 

It was... disturbing, honestly. The closer you get to New York, the more chaos and devastation there is. And then there’s the smell. It was only March, but, you know, global warming, and there are all those rotting bodies - millions, probably - in and around the city...

[Gene turns a little gray and closes his eyes. Courtney strokes his hair.]

CW: It’s OK, you don’t have to go on.

GB: [taking a deep breath] No. It’s fine... So, the first time, we had to turn back. We tried again the next day, but with gas masks Teddy found in the house of a survivalist he’d known. Poor guy -- he was completely prepared, just not for what happened.

Anyway, the masks blocked most of the stench, though they didn’t do a damn thing for the feeling of creeping horror at the thought of what was _causing_ the stench. I still have nightmares about it. Plus, it was around 80 degrees most days, and more like 90 or so in the masks. And you couldn’t take off the masks for relief without puking your guts up.

You could cool off with the AC in the trucks, but you still couldn’t take off the masks. And we couldn’t make the trips at night because the roads were unlit and unnavigable. 

So, rather than make the 10 or 15 trips we initially planned on, we had to do over 30 shorter trips. 

We also found an abandoned house about 5 miles out of the stink zone and set up a changing station, where we could trash our stench-infused work clothes, shower off, and put on fresh clothes before heading back.

CW: Yeah, I remember when you came back from that first trip. Even though you turned back partway there, anyone who came within 10 feet of you guys barfed.

GB: Not sexy. Anyway, It took months, but we brought back hundreds and hundreds of solar panels and associated hardware. Enough to power the entire Old Town area, with a bunch left over in case of faulty units. 

Now, all we had to do was install the damn things. This is where Teddy really shined. Retrieving the panels took brute strength and intestinal fortitude, but installing them on hundreds of mostly 75 to 100-year-old buildings took his know-how. Not just his electrician skills, but his knowledge of the various antiquated systems in place, and an incredible ability to improvise solutions on the spot. 

We spent almost three months on the rooftops, at the height of the summer - brutal - following his instructions, or handing him whatever tool he needed - like nurses assisting a surgeon - whenever he encountered something weird or unexpected. Which was about four or five times a day. This town’s power infrastructure - at least in the older section - was cobbled together by a couple of successive generations of madmen, all of whom were apparently competing for the Most Abstruse Solution to a Simple Problem award.

But it’s done now. You’re welcome.

But seriously - Teddy, my man, you’re a freakin' hero. Wherever you are right now, take a bow.

CW: [Clapping] Yay, Teddy!

GB: Now, I think we all want to hear about the water project you were on, but after all of that heavy stuff about rotting corpses, I’m thinking we could use a little palate-cleanser.

CW: I know I could. So... [looking through her pages of notes] ...what have we got here that qualifies as Mango Sorbet? 

GB: [looking through his own notes] Ah! I’ve got it. Community announcements.

CW: Perfect. Here’s my list.

GB: And here’s mine. Who should go first?

CW: Me, obviously. You just talked for like five minutes.

GB: Good point. OK. Go for it.

CW: [clears throat] Seymour’s Bay Community Announcements, Monday, September15, 2025.

 

This Saturday, September 20th, come celebrate the reopening of Wonder Wharf! All rides have been painstakingly inspected - and repaired where necessary - and are ready to twirl, spin, bounce and thrill once more! All games and activities will be staffed, and all your favorite sweet treats will be available.

The Wharf opens at 9 am and closes at 10 pm. Be there!

And in honor of the nationwide legalization of pot, which occurred literally one day before the plague was first reported, so no one could really enjoy it, local pot-growers will be giving out samples of their wares. 

Word of mouth says that Mr. Fischoeder's private blend, Fisch Food - reputedly a direct genetic descendant of one of Bob Marley's personal plants - is worthy of its lineage

GB: Can confirm. Saturday's going to be so awesome. Thanks for making that happen, Mr. Fischoeder.

Next announcement: The staff of the Seymour’s Bay Semi-Pro Community Hospital Project is proud and relieved to announce that their first genuine surgical procedure went off without a hitch, and that Mr. Dennis Jameson is now rid of his pesky appendix. 

Dr. Angela Shin would like to thank her student nurses Colleen Masterson, George Kramer and Jessica Devlin for their assistance. She adds: “Jessica, your parents were both doctors, and I know they'd be proud - just 14 and already a medical professional.”

Wait... Jessica Devlin? Is she the one Louise knew? From the sleepover?

CW: What’s up Gene?

GB: Louise had a classmate - just an acquaintance, really - that got dragooned into sleeping over at our house with a handful of other girls one night because mom decided it was absolutely necessary. It was a weird night -- I got used as a human shield at one point. Don't ask. But eventually that night Louise and Jessica became friends.

But we haven’t heard from her since before the plague. I think she was on vacation somewhere when it hit. 

If she made it back here, though, you'd think she would have contacted us at some point, or just turned up in public or something. But that bit about her parents being doctors fits...

Well, I don't know if it's her - but if it is, and you’re watching, Jessica, come by the studio and say hi, or visit us at home, next door to the old restaurant.

Aaaaaaaaaaanyway... moving on.

CW: Siobhan Finkelstein... Am I pronouncing that first name right?

GB: Shi-von. It’s Celtic.

CW: Ah. OK. Siobhan Finkelstein is looking for participants for a weekly drum circle, Wednesday nights at dusk in the park. All are welcome. Bring your own drum, or raid one of the local music stores.

That’s all I’ve got. Any more on your sheet, Gene.

GB: I’ve got some personal ads.

CW: Oooh - lookin’ for love in the New World. Exciting. 

GB: Well, potentially. 

So first up we have: Mature male cuddle muffin seeks female companion to share large, victorian-style treehouse. Into retreating from the world, drinking semi-moderately, and judging others. Ideal match will have been wealthy before the apocalypse, used to the finer things, and looking for a kindred spirit to weather the transition to a moneyless, classless society. Reply to ff@personals.panow.com.

Good luck FF. By the way ladies, he’s an excellent ice skater, very spry for his age.

[Courtney looks at him disapprovingly]

...I mean, I would imagine. You know, reading between the lines.

Moving on.

Asexual 20-something furry seeks playmate, any age or gender. Not into yiffing, obviously, just looking for fun and companionship. Reply to furi@personals.panow.com. That's "f-u-r-i," at etcetera.

CW: Huh. didn’t know we had any furries among us. Cool.

GB: Yeah. Last one: Smart, strong, sensual woman, 18, seeks male companion, more or less in her age range, who appreciates those qualities. Not the traditional sex-symbol type, but if you like “sexy librarians” or whatever, I’m all that and a bag of potato chips.

Just looking to have fun at first, but hoping for a deep connection. If you’re smart, kind and funny, we might just find it.

Open to ethical non-monogamy or poly arrangements if we’re the right mix.

Reply to [ wildhorses@personals.panow.com](mailto:wildhorses@personals.panow.com).

GB: Ummmm... Well, okay. Good luck with that, WildHorses. And seriously guys, she’s a real catch. And hot to trot.

CW: Gene!

GB: Reading between the lines. And sorry, the "hot to trot" thing was just a joke. I couldn't resist the horse theme.

Moving on. Courtney, why don’t you tell everyone why we don’t need to boil our tap water anymore.

CW: Well, thanks to the public utility expertise of Mr. Frank Bell of Camden, New Jersey, and the assistance of four dedicated volunteers, we were able to trace the town’s water supply to the Swimming River Reservoir and treatment facility in Middleton.  
  
Now, that was just a matter of crossing our fingers, hoping that Google was still limping along that day, and searching for “reservoir near me.”  
  
The hard part was figuring out how to get the treatment plant running again. 

Frank is familiar with how the overall system works, but he had never operated the machinery. It’s a massive system with multiple stages of purification, all of which require different chemicals or organic materials to disinfect and filter out dangerous bacteria and pollutants in the water.  
  
It took over a week of trial and error to get the computers and monitoring devices working properly, and about a month to repair damaged and neglected machinery - which Frank did pretty much by intuition alone.  
  
But here’s the thing - which we were all in complete denial about the whole time: The necessary purification supplies just aren’t available in large enough quantities anywhere in the tri-state area, and, even worse, it needs around-the-clock trained staff and frequent maintenance.  
  
So in the long run, it was an intense learning and team-building experience - Jody, Pocket-Sized Rudy, Dave Judd and me are like practically psychic now. It’s awesome.

GB: Cool. But if the reservoir didn’t work out, where are we getting our clean water from, he asked already knowing the answer.

CW: Well, it's... wells. Almost a dozen. Some were already existing private wells that were serving very exclusive developments in the area. We managed to divert them into the public system, which took a total of about two miles of above-ground piping and repeated animal sacrifices to the spirit of Rube Goldberg.

The others, we built. Or dug, I guess. Between finding the right locations, finding the right equipment - very very heavy equipment - learning how to _run_ the equipment, learning everything we needed to know to construct functional wells, doing the construction, connecting the wells to the existing infrastructure - that was a nightmare, by the way - and closing off the local pipes from the untreated reservoir water, the whole process took almost nine months of incredibly intense physical labor in uncomfortable conditions. Which we concluded ten days ago.

For the next week or so we tested the water at multiple locations through the town about every 8 hours. We were able to give every section a "safe" rating as of last Friday. After that, we retested daily, with no decline in quality. 

So, as of midnight, the local tap water supply is not only safe and potable, but actually of higher quality than the pre-plague supply. 

So, we're really proud of our work, but in need of a serious vacation. I feel exhausted just talking about it.

GB: I'm exhausted just from listening to you talk about it. 

[CW glares at GB]

GB: That wasn't a dig. As it were. I'm just saying I empathize. That sounds even harder than the solar panel project.

CW: Well, except for the stench of death part. I'd do ten more years digging wells before I'd do one day on the outskirts of New York.

GB: Speaking of which - the ten more years thing, I mean - how long before we outgrow the available well-water and need to start digging again?

CW: Good question. Glad I told you to ask it. The new wells are very substantial. Frank thinks that they could support the full pre-plague population of Seymour's Bay.

But to be safe, he figures we should start digging again at the halfway point, about 5,000 people. But unless things really pick up, that day is a long way off.

So for the moment, as long as we're obsessive about maintaining the current setup, we're good.

GB: Awesome. Electricity and clean water. I think that calls for a high five.

[CW raises her hand, but Gene does not follow suit. CW stares at him quizzically.]

GB: No, I mean a mouth high five.

[CW rolls her eyes, but leans in for her kiss, which turns out to be a rather lengthy one.]

CW: [flushed and a bit breathless] So, um, whew, um, so... what were we going to do next?

GB: Hold on. The blood hasn't rushed back to my brain just yet... Ok. Community News and Gossip.

CW: Gene, I thought we decided not to do the gossip part.

GB: Yeah, but I changed our mind.

CW: Gene...

GB: Don't worry. No humans will be harmed in the making of this segment. We're not doing negative, destructive gossip. Strictly positive, uplifting rumors.

CW: [Sighs] Fine.

So, here's what's happening around Seymour's Bay. I mean, other than the electricity and the water and the stuff in the announcements.

First off, last night's community meeting was a humdinger -- and kind of a buzzkill after the good infrastructure news.

After four months of detailed exploration and observation, the Farmlife and Wildlife Survey Team presented their results last night, and the news is discouraging.

Within a 40-mile radius of Seymour's Bay, the team observed no living mammals larger than a squirrel. No cats, wild or domestic, ditto dogs. 

Birds have fared better, with no appreciable decline in population or missing species. Likewise, bugs and insects seem to be largely unaffected.

GB: Now, I'm sure most of you are thinking "no cats and dogs, but all the bugs and insects? Hasa Diga Eebowai!" But for what it's worth, on a strictly practical level, the Earth can survive without cats and dogs - if you call that surviving - but without bugs, insects, and birds, the whole planetary ecosystem falls apart at the plant-life level, life on the surface of the earth is literally over. Only ocean life survives.

CW: The other advantage to the vulnerability to large mammals to the plague is that we've been spared packs of feral dogs ripping surviving humans to shreds, bears wandering out of forested areas and adding us to their standard diet, that kind of thing.

GB: Unfortunately, that's all the silver lining we get, because the big fallout from this discovery is that we are now officially facing a world without lamb chops, bacon, and steak - and by extension... [deep breath] hamburger.

I know that for most people, it's the prospect of life without bacon that makes them want to down a bottle of Klonopin. But I'm the son of a burger man, who was himself the son of a burger man. I grew up living above and working in a burger joint. 

Burgers paid for my food and clothes. I spent countless hours outside our family restaurant, dressed in a burger costume. The smell of hamburger still lingers in our restaurant and our home. I think you can smell it our sweat.

I - no, we, the Belcher's, _are_ hamburger. It's in our DNA. I... [GB, emotionally overwhelmed, is unable to continue]

CW: [reaching over to hug GB] it's OK, Genie-beanie. It's a big planet. There must be cows out there somewhere.

GB: [skeptically] yeah, sure.

Uh, sorry about that, folks. It's just something I take really personally.

Anyway, after about 10 minutes of wailing, gnashing of teeth and rending of garments, and a rambling eulogy for cow meat by mayor Belcher, the meeting settled down into a practical discussion of sustainable methods of starvation prevention.

We'll spare you the full transcript of the meeting, which ran into the wee hours, but the following resolutions were reached:

1 - The town thanks the survey team for their meritorious service. We didn't like what they had to report, but we in Seymour's Bay do not shoot the messenger (see Town Bylaws, chapter 7, paragraph 12: Shooting policy, comma, messengers).

2 - Available members of the survey team, using their observations as a reference, will lead volunteers on a mission to collect escaped and wild chickens, turkeys, and other fowl, and return them to the local dairy farm, to produce eggs for human consumption. Once they have reproduced in sufficient numbers, some may also be slaughtered for meat.

3 - Attempts to find and harvest adequate concentrations of fish to provide a worthwhile amount of food for the community having proved impossible, our focus will now be on creating a fishery and breeding a supply for ourselves. 

and 4 - In the absence of experts in the field, we are accepting volunteers to learn the trade from books and other sources.

End resolutions.

As an aside, some foolish individual suggested to the mayor that he could at least make turkey burgers, triggering a rant that was still raging on 15 minutes later when the last straggler left the auditorium. 

I have no idea what WildHorses was thinking.

CW: Gene!

GB: Readingbetweenthelines!

CW: [facepalm] тебе повезло, что ты так хорош в том, чтобы съесть меня.

GB: What the fuck was that?! Are you speaking in tongues? Should I get an exorcist?

CW: no, I'm fine. That was Russian for "you're lucky you're so good at eating me out."

[remembering she has an audience]

...

GB: ...

CW: ...

GB: ... Um, thank you? And I'm sorry. And Lenore, please tell me we're on 5-second delay and you caught that.

Lenore (offscreen): uhh nope, and nope.

GB: well, while Courtney gathers herself... wait - how many languages can you say that in?

CW: Five. I got really bored and horny at the same time one day and spent half an hour entering stuff like that into Google Translate.  
  
GB: Ah. OK. Anywaaaaaay... I guess I'll do the next news item. It's not bad news, precisely, but it's not especially good either.

Four months after his disappearance, Olly Pesto remains missing, but there has been another sighting of his graffito, this time about 10 miles further out of town than the last.

His distinctive drawing of two overlapping stick figures - obviously symbolizing his relationship with his late twin, Andy - with a similarly overlapping A and O beneath them - has been seen as far out as Bay Head before this Tuesday's discovery near Route 70 in Brick Township.

It's unclear just how old the spray-painted drawing is. And unfortunately, until someone finds one that's still wet and dripping, there's no point in sending out a search party.

On a personal note - I've never told anyone this before, but I think I was the last person here to see him.

[staring into the distance, at nothing]

He was crashing on the Belcher family couch for three months since Andy died. He was practically in a coma - we had to force him to eat and drink. For months, we did what we could just to keep him alive.

Then, one day, I woke up early and found him awake and alert, slinging a heavy backpack over his shoulder.

I asked him what was going on, and he said "he's calling me, man. I gotta go."

I said "He’s calling you. Are you hallucinating or is that a euphemism for 'I'm going off to kill myself now'"

He said "Neither. Both. I don't know. But I gotta go."

I looked at him for a long time. He smiled patiently. Then I said "Ok," hugged him, and watched him leave.

Maybe I should have stopped him. Restrained him, called for help, something.

But I figured unless we locked him in jail or a padded cell, he was going to leave. All we could do is delay him.

He had clearly packed supplies. He wasn't planning to die immediately. And I mean, he and Andy really had been psychic with each other, I'd seen it in action.

Maybe Andy really was calling him. Maybe he'd even find him out there somewhere. Maybe he has. One way or another.

I'm not holding my breath to find out. I doubt we'll ever know where he went and what happened to him and when.

Still, his hobo signs continue to pop up. Maybe he will, too. Eventually. One way or another.

 

CW: [nearly whispering] Gene, you never told me any of this. Why?

GB: You already had a lot to deal with. And honestly, I was trying to forget about it. Or trying to decide whether I should feel guilty.

CW: I think you did the right thing, Gene. 

[long pause]

Whew. Ok, well this show has turned out to be a lot darker than we originally envisioned. But I think we're past the worst of it. 

We all are.

GB: You know, we have several more items on our agenda, but I think it would be better if we take some time to regroup, and come back next Monday morning refreshed, well-rested, and lightly sedated.

CW: Agreed.

So, ok, this has been sort of a false start, particularly given our intention for this show to be fun and uplifting.

But seriously, the show is called "Post-apocalypse Now." And it really is the post-apocalypse. So, there's gonna be some dark stuff.

So, thank you all for watching, and tune in next week when, with any luck, the show will be entertaining rather than harrowing.  
  
GB: Coming up next - if you have Auto-Play on, a playlist of 80s sitcoms. Spoiler Alert: they do not hold up very well.  
  
CW: Bye-bye. See you tomorrow.  
  
GB: Tee Tee El Why!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to take so long getting back to this. It's been just one thing after the other. A seemingly endless series of First World Problems that nevertheless needed to be dealt with.

Chapter 6

 

LOUISE

 

“We were staying in a rented cabin in the White Mountains when it hit. It’s pretty remote, so we figured it was best to stay put. The nearest town was Jackson, which is tiny, so we never had any intruders, healthy or otherwise. And the owners of the cabin were Mormons, so there was a year’s worth of food in the cellar.”

 

Jessica is staring out at the sea through the bay window of her apartment. She chose it because it’s close to the medical clinic, but the view is a definite perk.

 

“Honestly, we thought we’d lucked out - and I guess we had. We were healthy, we had plenty of food, great views... once the TV news stopped, I could convince myself that we were just on a long vacation, getting away from it all. Roughing it, maybe, by our standards - no media, no telecommunications...

 

“I could sustain that illusion for hours at a time. After about four months away from civilization -- I mean, you know, not that there actually was any...”

 

Her words trail off. I have no urge to fill the silence; I know it’s anything but quiet inside her head. I’ll let her take her time negotiating the cacophony - I know the process well. I’ve been through it hundreds of times. She’ll be back when she finds the exit. 

 

Still silent, she turns away from the window, from the beautiful emptiness of the sea, and joins me on the expensive white, crushed-leather couch. The apartment is full of pieces of similar quality - the previous owner had probably spent something like 20 grand just filling the medium-sized one-bedroom apartment with its exquisitely - yet somehow ostentatiously - tasteful furnishings. 

 

And even though such things no longer have any monetary value, I’m still reflexively terrified to touch anything, lest I leave a smudge or a scratch or a scuff mark. If I do, surely the original owner will rise from the grave, barge through the door, and demand to talk to my parents, and I’ll get in so much trouble.

 

For her part, Jessica is completely at home amid the treasure left behind by the deceased, and no wonder - both her parents were well-paid medical specialists, and both came from wealthy families to begin with. She’s used to this kind of thing. To hear her tell it, her grandparents would have looked down their collective nose at a place like this. Servant’s quarters.

 

Frankly, I have no idea what had attracted her folks to Seymour’s Bay - which is a nice place but, compared to how they grew up, might as well have been Hell’s Kitchen. I don’t know, maybe that was the point. 

 

Jessica doesn’t say anything, but she’s on her way back from wherever she went.

 

I reach out to place my hand on hers - not a characteristic gesture for me, but it seems the right thing to do. Jessica is a gentle soul. Tough as nails when necessary, mind you; but she’s a comforting, calming influence. Very much like Rudy, now that I think of it. I guess I’m just drawn to that kind of person. 

 

It probably says something significant about me, but I don’t care to discuss it. Engage in armchair psychoanalysis if you’re looking for a free ticket to deepest Slapabama.

 

My instincts are correct. Jessica smiles warmly at me and places her other hand over mine. Something passes between us - a feeling, some form of communication; something familiar, but seen from an unusual angle.

 

Ah, fuck me, I know exactly what I’m feeling. Love. I love this girl, for all the same reasons I love Rudy. Not as deeply or passionately - we haven’t spent nearly as much time together and, well, she’s a girl. But man, if I had a lesbian bone in my body...

 

"About four months ago, my folks woke me up really early. Their eyes..."

 

She's shaking. I expect the floodgates to open. It's OK, I know how to help a friend through an explosion of near-infinite grief. I could write a Master's thesis on the subject.

 

Instead, she locks eyes with me. It seems to steady her. I don't know why, but I get the strong impression she thinks I can actually fully empathize with her experience of losing both parents. Honestly, I can't imagine. 

 

But infinite grief? Back of my hand.

 

“It’s OK. You don’t have to talk about it.”

 

But I guess she did.

 

“They were so... matter of fact about it. Clinical, even. They were doctors. Maybe that was their way of coping - they compartmentalized. We had enough Oxycodone on hand to do the job. I wasn’t going to have to shoot them or anything. 

 

“They didn’t even wait. They just walked with me to a spot behind a slope so it wouldn't be visible from the cabin, apologized profusely for leaving me with the task of digging their grave, and took the pills. Then we just sat on the ground and held each other until it was over.

 

"I don't remember much after that. I don't remember digging the grave, not even a fleeting image. I don't remember freaking out, or even grieving, really. I must have been on autopilot for weeks -- feeding myself, maintaining a bare minimum standard of hygiene. Basic survival stuff, no higher-order functions. And when I snapped out of it... I had no fucking idea what to next.

 

"I mean, my fallback was just 'sit around and wait for death.' The plague had run its course by then, but I had no way of knowing that. The thought of venturing out into what was left of the world... what I would see... all alone, defenseless -- well, there were hunting rifles and ammo in the cabin, but I’d never fired a gun in my life. And I’d never had a driving lesson; I’d be on foot, or maybe I could find a bike.

 

“Jessica Devlin, 14, rifles strapped to her shoulders, backpack full of energy bars and maxi-pads, wandering the Zombie Apocalypse Wasteland on a 5-speed. The image was so ridiculous, I had a five-minute psychotic laughing fit about it.

 

“But on the other hand, fuck it. It was the end of the world. Everything and everyone I knew was probably gone. The moment the laugh attack was over, I decided to embrace the suck. I could hack being a sci-fi/horror movie heroine; plus, face it: I didn’t really have any other viable career options.”

 

I snort at that. Jessica, Miss Flour Spice, for all her deadpan, Tina-sans-neuroses speech inflections, can be fucking hilarious and has an almost preternatural gift for gallows humor. She should be the first standup comic of the post-Apocalypse. Now  _ there’s  _ a career option. I gotta suggest that to her; seriously, it would be epic.

 

Anyway, my laughter breaks the solemn mood. Jessica hugs me forcefully - desperately - and we giggle and cry gently on each other’s shoulders. We both know how her epic journey ended, with her more or less safe in the arms of Seymour’s Bay. But I know that between New Hampshire and New Jersey lay hundreds of miles of alternating soul-crushing devastation and eerie emptiness. She knows because she lived it, and I know because how could it be otherwise.

 

“I found some maps covering the East Coast - it didn’t even occur to me that the GPS network might still be functioning. Avoiding major metro areas for obvious reasons, I was looking at about a 450-mile trip...

 

“It took a few days of tooling back and forth on the dirt path to the cabin, but I taught myself to drive. We had a hybrid with a full tank of gas, and I could fit a few more tank's worth of the gas cans we had in stock for the generator in the trunk - dangerous cargo, but Danger was now my middle name, so...

 

“I loaded up the back seat with food and bottled water, and put every weapon I could find in the passenger seat...”

 

“Shotguns riding shotgun. Check,” I observe - very proud of myself for the witticism. Jessica rewards me with a nod and a wan grin that say “good one. I’ll laugh about it later.” 

 

I shut up.

 

“I don’t know what I expected. Streets full of dead, rotting bodies. Packs of feral dogs. Road Warrior gangs. That girl from The Ring movie.

 

“But at least when I started out, when I left the woods and got onto 302, there was... nothing. No bodies, no abandoned cars, just emptiness. Which was normal of course, the area is - was - barely populated to begin with, but I was expecting some kind of sign that the world had ended. 

 

"But, nothing. Just empty road. The complete lack of traffic should have registered, but I guess I was expecting something... Biblical. A blighted landscape. Armies of Darkness. I guess the local residents chose to die in the comfort of their own homes, with a little dignity. 

 

“After a few minutes of driving in complete silence, I started to freak out. I put a CD in the player, but that was even worse. I figured something upbeat - Cyndi Lauper, “She’s So Unusual.” Can’t go wrong with the classics, right? But I shut it off after about 8 bars, and I had to stop the car so I could scream my throat bloody for about 5 minutes. 

 

“I guess pop music was the wrong choice. Under the circumstances, it wasn’t cheerful, it was... grotesque. I mean, you listened to recordings of dead musicians all the time, right? Maybe “Billie Jean” would play in the background at the grocery store, and if you thought about it at all, and were feeling a little morbid, maybe you’d think ‘wow. He was alive then, and he’s gone now. And I’m listening to him stuck in time, in a moment when he was on top of the world, with no idea that he’d be dead way too young.’ And of course, there were a hundred years of recordings still in circulation, and old movies. And the thoughts of people going back thousands of years on paper...

 

“But now, any music you listen to, any movies you watch, even ones that came out a year ago, everyone you’re listening to or watching is dead. Recently. And everything they’re singing about, the entire cultural context, is gone. Dead. And movies... Street scenes. Crowds. Daily life... all gone. 

 

“So I guess that’s when it hit me. The enormity of what had happened. 7 billion people dead in like 9 months. My parents, my grandparents, aunts, my uncles, my cousins, every friend I ever had (I assumed): dead; I had no reason to think otherwise. 

 

“Cyndi Lauper, dead.

 

“I just lost it. After my voice gave out, I just sat there in the car, hyperventilating, then forgetting to breathe. Pounding on the dashboard. Smashing all the CDs.

 

“Eventually, I passed out. Spent the night in the car, on 302, in that kind of dreamless, surgical anaesthesia sleep so deep there’s no sense of time passing - It was noon, I blinked, and the sun was rising. I honestly don’t know for sure that I only slept one night.

 

"I forced myself not to think about it. About anything. I was a self-driving car, unoccupied. I'd plotted my route. 

 

"I drove.

 

"I didn't encounter anything but road the first day. I took it slow - novice driver. I took back roads - avoiding population centers, to keep rotting corpse sightings to a minimum - fewer freakouts, less exposure to the traditional diseases present in decay.

 

"But it's funny -- by the end of the day, I started adjusting my route to take me closer to Concord, the nearest population center. It was actually incredibly unnerving, driving around all that pristine emptiness. I needed a glimpse of the horror to convince myself I wasn't a brain in a jar. 

 

"I stopped about 5 miles out of town around sundown - no point facing the horror at night. Broad daylight would be bad enough.

 

"It was surprisingly easy to sleep. No fear. I was just a self driving car. I shut myself off and dreamed of electric sheep.

 

"The next morning, I drove into Concord. I wasn’t as sure as I’d been the previous night that I wanted to do this, but it had just occurred to me that I hadn’t brought any changes of clothes with me -- a weird oversight, but I’d been in a weird state of mind, of course.

 

“So, fine. I’ll find a clothing store, grab a bunch of stuff in my size, and get out. A surgical strike.

 

“I don’t know what I was expecting. Carnage, I guess. Twisted, rotting bodies on the street. Evidence of panic and rioting. Horror.

 

“What I found was signs directing citizens to a mass grave they could bring their dead to. I didn’t follow it. There were bodies on the roads and sidewalks, but they were all covered with or wrapped up in tarps. 

 

"I guess that toward the end, the mass grave filled up, or the ratio of corpses to survivors was too high to allow for the interment of every dead body, but they chose to give the remaining dead a little dignity by covering them up. 

 

“I think it was the saddest thing I’ve ever seen. I knew almost everyone everywhere was dead, that was no shock. But what struck me was: there clearly had been no rioting. The streets were clean. Swept. In the face of the End, they’d been civilized. Dignified. A community. 

 

“I don’t know if they thought about it this way, but I got a very clear message: _ We were here. We were a community. We were our brothers’ keepers. We’re gone now, but we tidied up before we left. Enjoy Concord. We did. _

 

“Or something like that. They’d left behind a clean, beautiful town as a last testament to their humanity. To their civility.

 

“I just sat there and cried -- not hysterical, panicked, throat-shredding wailing. Just regular crying. For the first time since it all started, I grieved. For my family, my friends, for everyone in the world. For the citizens of Concord. For Cyndi Fucking Lauper.

 

“When it was over, I did something that surprised the hell out of me. I got out, stood in the middle of the street, and prayed.”   
  
Yeah, that’s a surprise, allright. “Really. I thought you were an atheist.”   
  
“I was. I am. But... it was all I could do. I recited the Kaddish, the Mourner’s prayer. For the people in front of me wrapped up in tarps, for Concord, for the entire world. For a moment, I had this psychotic idea that I would recite it 7 billion times - once for every human being who died, give or take. Then I came to my senses and settled on doing it just once, for everybody. 

 

“I started praying, but stopped myself, climbed up on top of my car, stretched out my arms...” 

 

She makes this gesture now, and closes her eyes. She slowly lowers her arms, and surprises me again.

 

Y itgadal v’yitkadash sh’mei raba b’alma di-v’ra

chirutei, v’yamlich malchutei b’chayeichon

uvyomeichon uvchayei d’chol beit yisrael, ba’agala

uvizman kariv, v’im’ru: “amen.”

Y’hei sh’mei raba m’varach l’alam ul’almei almaya.

Yitbarach v’yishtabach, v’yitpa’ar v’yitromam

v’yitnaseh, v’yithadar v’yit’aleh v’yit’halal sh’mei

d’kud’sha, b’rich hu,

l’eila min-kol-birchata v’shirata, tushb’chata

v’nechemata da’amiran b’alma, v’im’ru: “amen.”

Y’hei shlama raba min-sh’maya v’chayim aleinu

v’al-kol-yisrael, v’im’ru: “amen.”

Oseh  shalom bimromav, hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu

v’al kol-yisrael, v’imru: “amen.”

 

It’s beautiful. Hypnotic. I don’t understand a word, of course, but somehow I get the gist. And I guess I’m not done with my own grieving, because she just finished, and I’m sobbing. 

 

Andy. Jimmy Jr. Daryl. Millie. Josh. Lenny DiStefano. Logan. Abby. Mr. Ambrose. Mr. Branca. Ms. LaBonz. Ms. Schnur. Bryce. Dr. Yap. Coach Blevins. Gretchen. Jairo. Sasha. Mickey. Aunt Gayle. 300 kids I’d gone to school with whose names I don’t remember. And most of their parents. Thousands of people whose presence was part of the background noise of my everyday life for over a decade.

 

I never even particularly liked the majority of those people. It doesn’t matter. They’re gone, and I miss them. And I’m crying my fucking eyes out. Mourning them as I probably should have all along; but I’d been too obsessed with the fragile health of a single, regular-sized person. 

 

“Amen,” I agreed.

 

We’re both sobbing now, this time not on each other’s shoulders. We’re grieving separately - Parallel play, in child-psychologist terms. 

 

“I found pretty much the same thing in every small town I ventured into. I mean, Concord was... special, but... 

 

“I don’t know how it was in the cities. I can’t even imagine what went on in New York, LA, Chicago...” She shudders. 

 

“But I visited a few more towns about the size of Concord, or smaller, and it was always clean streets, no looting, no bodies exposed to the elements. The places where everybody knew everybody else - they took care of each other. Took care of their little towns. I guess because there was nothing else to do.

 

“You know, I never bought that idea that ‘small town America’ was the  _ real _ America, the  _ good _ America, where the  _ good _ people were. I’m sure the big cities were full of heroes - people who kept their neighborhoods, their blocks, even just their households together in the face of the End of All Things. People who spent their last hours comforting and consoling others; who died running into burning buildings to save others who would be dead the next day anyway. In fact, I’d bet there were two or three heroes for every looter, for every sociopath who figured if they were going to get away with murder, it was the time.

 

“It’s just that in the big cities and the congested suburbs, there’s no evidence left behind.”

 

“Maybe not,” I say. “I’m sure there are millions of smartphones out there full of evidence. Most of it backed up to the cloud, for as long as it holds out. Hell, I keep toying with the idea of opening up YouTube and searching for the most recent uploads. I’m just too scared to look, you know?”

 

“Yeah,” she agrees.

 

There’s a long silence. I stare at her, gently but firmly. She knows what’s coming next; she doesn’t want to talk about it, but she accepts her fate. She nods.  _ Go ahead. Ask. _

 

“Jess, you’ve been back for six months. Why didn’t you contact me? Or anyone we both knew who survived? And how did you manage to stay hidden in broad daylight for so long? Do you possess the One Ring? Do you have one of those Men In Black amnesia sticks? Do you know how to cast the Obliviate spell? Seriously, what the one and only, actual, original, certified, accept-no-substitutes fuck?”

 

She sighs. “The  _ how  _ is simple -- I mean, it was really hard, but not complicated. I went nowhere and saw no one. I only ever talked to maybe three or four people, all sworn to secrecy, never worked on patients who were conscious, and spent 90 percent of my time either in this apartment studying or in the back room of the medical office working on cadavers.”

 

“Jesus,” I say. Unable to follow up with a cogent response, I ask, simply, “and the  _ why _ ?”

 

She closes her eyes and inhales deeply, through her nose, and breathes out, slowly, through her mouth. She’s centering herself. I get the strong impression she’s preparing to read a prepared speech - something she’s gone over in her head a hundred times. Maybe she even wrote it down and memorized it. 

 

I listen respectfully.

 

“I’m still trying to figure that out. I'm part way there. I know that on some level, I thought that if I only interacted with new people, people I’d never met and who weren’t part of my social circle before, I wouldn’t have to deal with how many of my friends and family members and acquaintances were gone. It would be a new start in a new town, only I would know the layout. It would be superficially the same, but no ghosts.

 

“I was wrong, of course. Everything and everyone here is haunted. I sleep with the lights on. The nightmares I’d never had at the cabin, I’ve had every night since I got back. Horrible things - some so horrible, I’d kill someone rather than describe them. Some nights they’re so bad I think about killing myself just to make them stop.”

 

_ Man, have I been there, sister.  _ I gaze at her with what I hope is an expression of infinite understanding and sympathy.

 

“Still, I figured I’d adapt eventually. I was even making a tiny bit of progress in that direction when Dr. Shin announces my presence all over your brother’s little YouTube show. And here we are.”

 

“Here,” I agree, “we are.”

 

“So, um... did that make any sense?” she asks.

 

Good question. “Probably. I don’t know. Yeah. Maybe.”  _ OK, that’s not speech, that’s just neurons firing randomly. Get it together!  _ “I mean, I know it makes sense to you. I know you’re telling the truth. But  _ six months _ ?”

 

Jess hangs her head. “I’m sorry.”

 

“Don’t be. It’s the end of the fucking world. There are no established standards of etiquette. You did what you had to do.”   
  
She looks back up at me. For a moment I think she’s crying again, but her eyes are just still puffy from before, and she’s wearing that smile that I’d long ago discovered meant  _ mischief ahead _ .  

 

“So we’re cool?” she asks, her raised eyebrow saying  _ we better be, or you’re gonna miss out on some fun, highly irresponsible shit _ , but her cracking voice betraying apprehension.

 

In the end, there can be only two. We’re back, no question. Who could even doubt it?

 

“Damn straight we are, my sister by another mister.” I stand up and grab my backpack. “Let’s go get in trouble!”


End file.
